Corson

The flickering candle flame played over Wren’s face as she used her fingers to scoop out the last of the food from the glass jar she held. Her eyes closed as she shoved the food into her mouth. It was clearly empty, but she dipped her fingers back into the jar and ran them over the cleaned glass. She stared morosely into it for a minute before setting it aside.

Walking over to the cabinet she’d retrieved it from, I removed another jar of food from the dozen or so stocked on the shelves. Wren was shaking her head at me before I could return to her with the jar.

“You’re still hungry,” I stated.

“Yes, but if we take from a safe house, then we have to leave something behind. I’ve already taken something without being able to replace it. I can’t take more. I have nothing of use, except for my knife, and I can’t leave my only working weapon behind right now. Leaving a gun without bullets is pointless and could get someone killed if they don’t check it first. But I guess if they don’t check it first, then they deserve to die.”

She didn’t know how demon of a thing that was for her to say, but I refrained from pointing it out to her. She was talking to me, and my balls still ached from her kick.

“They do,” I agreed. I stared at her and then the jar in my hand. “It’s ridiculous for you not to eat when there is food.”

“We have to count on each other in the Wilds. If everyone took and didn’t give, there would be a lot less Wilders.”

I walked over and handed the jar to her when her stomach growled. I wouldn’t allow her to go hungry when there was food. “I’ll return here with something after we meet up with the others again. You need your strength.”

She hesitated before taking the jar of yellow stuff from my hands. She unscrewed the lid and dipped her fingers into it. I returned to the cabinets to close the door on the remaining jars and a handful of water bottles stacked neatly inside. The hinges creaked as the door swung shut.

I’d entered a few other houses in the Wilds before, but unlike those long-abandoned homes, this one didn’t have leaves and dirt covering the scuffed, white flooring. Earlier, Wren and I had pumped water from the well out back and brought it in the house. The water was cold, but when Wren was done, I’d stood in the upstairs tub and used it to clean the ouro blood and mud from me.

Like most demons, I bathed often and despised being filthy. Cold or not, I could have spent hours washing myself. However, concern for Wren had driven me quickly from the bathroom. She may refuse my protection, and I would try to give her the space she needed, but I would make sure she stayed safe.

Before going into the bathroom, Wren had shown me where to find a stash of clothing, and I’d donned some of them afterward. The bottom of the pants only fell to my ankles, while the sleeves of the shirt ended at mid forearm, but at least they were clean.

Wren had rolled her shirt sleeves up, but as she ate, one of them worked its way free to fall over her wrist and down to her hand. She didn’t bother to shove it back up. Her pants were also rolled and tucked above her ankles. The overly large clothing and her enthusiasm for her dinner made her look far younger. This was a rare glimpse of her with her guard down that I never got to see. Sensing my attention, she glanced at me before digging into her food again.

“Are there many of these… ah, what do you call these houses?” I asked.

She paused with her hand in the jar and lifted her head to look at me. A suspicious look crossed her face. She’s won’t even tell me this.

Then, she shrugged and scooped more mushy food out of the jar. “We call them safe houses, and they’re numerous.”

“And every one is set up the same?”

“Why do you ask?”

“Just curious.”

“No, they’re not.” Her brisk tone indicated she wouldn’t discuss it any further.

Lifting a candle holder away from the others on the counter, the small flame flickered as I walked over to stand in the doorway of the living room. We’d searched this entire place to make sure it was safe before settling in for the night. However, as I stared into the small room, I realized something was off in this house. It wasn’t menacing and there was nothing here that could attack us, yet something was wrong.

I gazed at the bare, dingy walls and dust-coated furniture as I tried to figure out what was different about this house. Now that I pondered it, I realized there had been something unusual about the upstairs too.

Then, my gaze settled on a darker spot of paint on the wall and it hit me. “Where are all the pictures?”

All the homes I’d been in before, including the abandoned ones, always had some photos left behind. Humans were oddly obsessed with documenting their time here as it progressed toward the inevitable end.

“Probably stashed somewhere,” she replied.

“Did the owners of this house put them away?”

“Doubtful.”

“Then who did?”

“Why does it matter?” she demanded.

I glanced over my shoulder at her. Resentment had tinted her words, but the look on her face was defensive. Her knuckles turned white on the jar as she held it between her crossed legs.

“It doesn’t,” I replied.

“Good.” She returned to scooping food out of the jar, but the hunched-over position of her shoulders made it seem as if she were waiting for a blow.

I turned my attention back to the bare walls. There was nothing personal in this house; unless I included the furniture, which I didn’t. Where had it all gone and why had it gone?

“Whoever established this safe house probably removed the pictures,” she said after a few minutes passed. “If not them, then someone else who stayed here put them away, along with any other things.”

I didn’t look at her or ask why; she would stop talking if I did. I suspected the other things were any personal items the original occupants had left behind when they fled their home or were killed.

“It’s easier that way,” she muttered.

Easier not to see the reminders of the people who had lived here and the lives they’d led. Lives similar to the ones the Wilders had once led, I realized.

“I see,” I said when she stopped speaking.

“I’m glad you do because I don’t. Not anymore.” She set the empty jar next to the first one.

“What do you mean?” I waited for the wall to slam down and Wren to stop speaking with me, but she continued.

“We take their things away because we don’t like seeing the reminders of a past lost to us all, but…”—her gaze traveled to me before flicking away—“we never really forget the past. No matter how much we try, it’s still there. Even when we think we’ve forgotten, pictures or not, the past and the dead come back to haunt us.”

She lifted her hand to rub her forehead, and I understood that Wren seeing her father’s remains again had affected her more than I’d known. The shadows under her eyes and the lines framing her mouth weren’t only from lack of sleep, but also sorrow. Seeing her house and her father again had done more than trigger an old nightmare into returning, it had torn her open and propelled her back into a past she’d buried for fourteen years.

She looked young and vulnerable now because in many ways she’d become that child watching her mother die all over again. Right then, I’d never wanted to hold someone as much as her, but I remained where I was. She had to work through this in her own way.

Her hand fell away, and she blinked at the kitchen as if she were seeing it for the first time. “I don’t know what I’m saying. In reality, the dead should only matter to demons, angels, and ghosts. Not to the living, not anymore. We can’t do anything for them. We bury them where they fall, if we’re able to take the time to bury them, and move on as if they never existed to begin with.”

“The dead should always matter to those they matter to,” I said. “If you prefer to remember them, then do so. If it’s easier to forget, then forget.”

“Thanks for your permission!” she retorted before heaving a sigh. “Sorry. I’m not usually so bitchy. Well, at least I’m not usually this consistently bitchy.”

She stared at the back door as she ran her fingers through her still-damp hair. It was the first time I’d seen her hair free of its braid, and I was unable to resist following her fingers as she worked the tangles from the pale blonde tresses free.

“I must bring out the best in you,” I teased.

She gave me a small smile. “I think I’m starting to realize that it's not easier to forget.”

“No, it’s not,” I agreed.

Rising to her feet, she wiped her ass off before bending to lift the jars and placing them in the sink. She stared into the flames of one of the three candles on the counter as she spoke. “When every safe house is established, one of the first things the Wilders do is put all the personal items away. This might sound a little crazy, but sometimes I leave something behind when I stay in one of them. Not something from the family who lived there, but something of mine. Usually, it’s a rock I found somewhere or a tree branch. Once I cut off a piece of my hair and left it under a couch cushion.”

The metal candle holder scoured the counter when she started twisting it. “I know it’s an odd thing to do, but I still do it. When I’m gone, all my useful things will be divided between the Wilders, as they should be. Anything personal of mine will be left behind. Though, I have nothing personal.

“Like the families who originally lived in the safe houses, I’ll be forgotten too, which is okay. I understand that, but by leaving small things behind, I know something of me will remain somewhere on this planet. Even if it’s something no one else will ever know about or recognize as mine, I know it’s there.”

She stopped turning the candle and hunched her shoulders up to her ears. “Why am I telling you this?” she murmured.

Lifting the candle, she turned to face me. Vulnerability shone in her eyes, but so did anger at herself, at me, and at the world, I was certain.

“I watched the human race more than most other demons while we were in Hell. Most never cared to see what was happening on Earth, but I did. I watched Charlemagne fight, the progression of what was later called the Middle Ages, the plague, the Crusades, the settlement of the new world, and the numerous wars and deaths over religions you humans had wrong. I followed the rise and fall of kings and queens, presidents, buildings, and time.

“Technology fascinated me. People made so many achievements in such a short period. Things that once wiped out entire cities and towns stopped being threats. Views changed, people changed, the clothing became less, the advances more, and then one day it all ended. Most of human civilization fell, most of what I’d seen ceased to exist in an instant, and I no longer had to watch from afar, but I was here.”

“Why did you watch us so much?” she inquired.

“I’m not sure,” I admitted. “For some reason, humans fascinated me. Maybe it was because, by the time I was born, demons weren’t allowed to cross back and forth between Hell and Earth. I think I would have ventured to Earth often, if the skelleins, the hellhounds, and the varcolac deemed me worthy of being able to do so.”

“What say would they have in it?”

“Kobal is the only one who can open a gateway between Hell and Earth, but when demons were allowed to travel to Earth, the varcolac, hounds, and skelleins worked together to guard the gates and the demons who passed through them. They also decided who they thought was worthy of passing through.”

“I didn’t know that.” She set the candle down again. “Did you watch the humans while they were naked and stuff?”

“I’m not that perverted,” I assured her with a laugh. “Besides, the oracle never revealed anything that specific.”

“What is the oracle?”

“It’s a lake of fire, deep in the bowels of Hell where demons could look on the human realm. Unlike some of the humans who glimpsed between the veils separating Hell and Earth, I didn’t see between those veils so I had to travel to the oracle. Few other demons made the journey as the oracle was also the central focus of heat in Hell.”

“Oh.”

“I am a little perverted though,” I teased and mentally kicked myself in the ass as soon as the words were out of my mouth. Not with Wren, I reminded myself, but to my surprise, she smiled.

“Not you, demon,” she teased back, and for the first time, she didn’t say the word demon as if it were something distasteful. Then her smile slid away and she reclaimed her candle. “Do you want the first watch or should I take it?”

“I’ll keep watch while you sleep.”

“Wake me in two hours.”

“I will,” I assured her and stepped aside to let her pass into the living room, but I wouldn’t wake her. She needed her sleep.

She walked over to the couch, set the candle down on the table, and glanced at the window. All the shades and curtains had been pulled over the windows before we’d entered the house. I assumed they always stayed that way so no one walking by would notice if something about the windows changed from one hour to the next.

I sat in the armchair across from Wren as she settled onto the couch. She pulled her knife free and placed it under a cushion before laying her head on it. Curling up on her side, she tucked her hands beneath her head.

She may tell herself she distrusted me, but she was asleep in minutes. Her breathing slowed, and her lips parted. My hands dug into the armchair as I drank in every detail of her until I couldn’t take it anymore. Rising, I stalked over to the window, before pacing back to gaze at her again. I had no idea what it was about this woman, but there were sirens with less pull over men than what she had over me.

That niggling feeling started at the back of my mind again. There had been no women since meeting her, and I had no desire for any others. The protectiveness I felt for her wasn’t something I’d ever experienced with a woman before, and I’d been infuriated when she’d compared me to her other partners. These were all things that were not me. Jealousy was not an emotion I’d ever experienced before, but Wren evoked it from me in an instant.

I ran a finger over one of my empty ears. I recalled thinking about finding another woman to rid myself of my lust for Wren, but the idea of bedding another repulsed me. Unless Wren started wearing jewelry, there would be no earrings for me in the future. Maybe there never would be again.

My hand fell away from my ear as I continued to stare at her and that niggling feeling became more incessant until it started to take a firmer hold over me.

She couldn’t be what I was beginning to suspect. Yes, she enchanted me, but she was human. Demons have found their Chosen with a human before.

And humans died far too easily.